True Love's Kiss And A Missing Heart
by Moultipass1
Summary: "You don't understand! It should have worked! You don't get it, I…" The words never make it past her lips and she feels her muscles go limp, her will to fight deserting her when it finally hits her – he didn't wake up, he didn't wake up – and her father's embrace is the only thing keeping her upright. "I know! Emma, I know," David says forcefully.


**I guess we're going to see a lot of those one-shots following the double episode, but this is my version, and I like it, so I'm posting it :) Please take a minute to tell me what you thought!**

**Spoilers for 4x08 and 4x09. It's set after the whole shattered mirror thing has been dealt with, but there's nothing specific and since I don't read spoilers, it's all just speculation on my part. Rated T for some swearing.**

**Disclaimer: nope, not mine. *curls into a ball and weeps***

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><p>No. No no no no no no.<p>

_No._

It's the only word that makes any kind of sense in her mind as her father carries Killian's limp form into the loft and kneels down next to the couch to deposit him on it, wincing when he stands back up. She's frozen in place, her feet refusing to carry her over to them the way her mind is screaming at them to.

Henry seems to have more control over his limbs than she does – or maybe he just isn't feeling like his entire world is falling apart and it makes it easier for him to do what she can't – and he takes a few quick steps to stand next to his grandfather, looking down at the pirate's pale face, his brow furrowed, deep in thoughts.

"What happened?" her son asks quietly, and the tone of his voice is like a trigger, enabling her to finally move, because there is no way Henry would stay this calm if Killian was… No. He's alive. He has to be.

As she takes her place next to her father, she vaguely registers the new arrivals. David came in first, but Mary Margaret, Elsa and Regina follow close behind, and Regina is the one who answers Henry's question.

"She froze him."

Relief floods through Emma at those words. Which might sound absurd, but it's really not when she thinks about it. After all, it could be much worse, and a little freezing curse is nothing they can't handle, not when she knows exactly how to undo it. She may not have said the words yet, but she knows, and he knows too.

"Good," she comments idly before kneeling down next to Killian and taking his hand in hers.

Without the slightest hesitation, she presses her lips to his, the contact lasting less than three seconds before she pulls back, already smiling because she knows those beautiful eyes of his are about to open and fall on her and widen in awe at the fact that _she woke him up_ and then he's going to slip his hand into her hair and pull her down to him for a much less chaste kiss and she'll laugh against his mouth and scold him because they have an audience but she'll not-so-secretly love it and they'll…

"Mom."

Henry's voice snaps her out of her daydream and she lets her gaze wander over to him. She frowns at the expression on his face – something caught between surprise, fear, and confusion – and she follows his line of sight back to Killian's face, expecting to see a smile on her pirate's lips.

Only they're still set in a thin line, his eyes are still closed, and he's still not moving.

Her heart stops and she feels her mouth fall open in shock.

"Killian?" She hates how small the word sounds, but there's no way to prevent it. All she can do is try to gather her strength to keep talking. "Hook, it's not funny," she scolds, her voice taking on a desperate edge as she shakes his shoulder lightly.

Still he doesn't react, and as realization slowly starts dawning on her, she shakes him harder and harder, tears gathering in her eyes until finally two strong arms wrap around her waist from behind and pull her back to prevent her from hitting Killian in her desperation to wake him up.

"Emma, Emma, stop." Her father's voice is soothing but it doesn't stop her from fighting him, and his grip tightens until she can barely breathe, though it may have more to do with the sobs that are caught in her throat. "Emma, calm down."

"Calm down?" she screeches, all but hysterical. "I… No, I… You don't understand! It should have worked! You don't get it, I…"

The words never make it past her lips and she feels her muscles go limp, her will to fight deserting her when it finally hits her – he didn't wake up, _he didn't wake up_ – and her father's embrace is the only thing keeping her upright.

"I know! Emma, I _know_," David says forcefully.

Strangely enough, this knocks some sense back into her and she straightens up, because if her father – expert of all things True Love – _knows_, if he can say it with so much conviction, then it means that she didn't fail, she didn't misinterpret her own feelings, she has no reason to doubt herself, not about this, and there must be another explanation for why her kiss didn't work. And if there's another explanation, it means they can do something about it.

"Why didn't it work?"

Henry's question mirrors her internal musings and she gives him a thankful smile, both for voicing her thoughts and for not doubting her feelings for the pirate either.

Finally remembering that there are other people in the room besides Killian, herself, Henry and her father, she turns to Regina, knowing that she's the most likely to have an answer since this _is_ a magical problem, but when the former mayor shakes her head helplessly, Emma allows her eyes to find Elsa. After all, she's the go-to girl when it comes to winter powers.

"I don't know, Emma," Elsa says softly, her eyes reflecting the Savior's pain. She and Killian have bonded over the past few weeks and Emma can see that she's scared too, the risk of losing a friend bringing her fears and insecurities back to the forefront of her mind. "You're right, it should have worked."

No one in the room seems to even think about offering the obvious explanation – that maybe her feelings are one-sided – and she's grateful for it. It may have taken her a while to accept her own feelings, but she will never, _ever_ doubt the fact that Killian loves her, and she doesn't have any time to waste trying to explain this to them.

"Okay, so what do we do?" She asks, proud to note that her voice sounds rational, betraying nothing of her inner turmoil.

There's only silence for a few seconds, and she wants to scream at them to come up with something _fast_ because by now Hook's body is almost entirely made of ice and they don't have much time.

Then Henry all but shouts, "Marian!"

"What?" Mary Margaret asks.

Henry turns to his adoptive mother.

"Maid Marian. You took her heart to keep it safe until you could find another way to save her. We can do the same with Killian."

Her kid's a freaking _genius_. She wonders who he gets it from. It's not from her, and it certainly cannot be from his father, God rest his soul.

Regina nods and walks over to stand next to Killian's shoulder. Before she can do it however, Emma gets a strange feeling in her chest, telling her that this is all kinds of wrong. No. Just no. She's not letting anyone handle her pirate's heart. It's hers.

"Wait!" she demands just a second before Regina's hand disappears beneath the ice covering Killian. "Let me do it."

The queen's eyebrows shoot up in surprise.

"Have you ever done this, Miss Swan?"

They all know the answer to that, so she doesn't bother answering the condescending question. She doesn't know how, but she _knows_ that she can do it. She's getting better at this magic stuff now that she's learned the secret to controlling it, thanks to Elsa, and she trusts her instincts more than ever. Seeing her determination, Regina steps back, arms crossed over her chest, and gives her a little nod, looking at her expectantly.

Emma takes a deep breath and pulls her arm back, hearing everyone in the room hold their breath when her hand goes straight through the ice and plunges into Killian's chest. She grins, proud that she did it without a hitch.

Her satisfaction is short-lived however, because she quickly realizes that something is amiss. Her face falls, and Henry releases his breath with an anxious question.

"What's wrong?"

"I… There's… There's nothing there."

The collective gasp sounds like a damn explosion in the otherwise quiet loft, and Emma swallows hard to hold back her frustration as she pulls back her hand. She looks at it like it's its fault, trying to make sense of what just happened. She's still glowering at her fingers when Regina pushes her aside with an exasperated sigh.

"Amateur," she grumbles before doing what Emma just did.

The Savior waits for it and, yep, there it is, the widening of her eyes that tells her that the queen just felt what she herself did, that Regina realized that she's neither lying nor as incompetent as she seems to think she is.

"There's nothing there."

"That's what I just said," Emma snaps as Regina pulls back her hand as well, taking a step back and considering the pirate with a mixture of curiosity and pensiveness.

"Now we know why True Love's kiss didn't work."

"Really?" Emma asks doubtfully.

Yeah, okay, she's made some progress, but she's still not a pro when it comes to magic. Sue her.

"He can't love you – not _truly_ – if he doesn't have his heart, Emma," David explains.

It makes sense.

And raises a whole lot of other questions. Starting with _where the fuck is Killian's heart?_

And just like that, her panic is back.

She can feel it taking a hold of her, threatening to overcome everything else and to make her forget that she's not alone. Her breath comes out in sharp pants that don't manage to get any oxygen into her lungs and she's this close to doubling over when a warm hand on her shoulder brings her back to herself.

"Breathe, honey. It's going to be alright," David says softly, and before she can bite his head off for trying to calm her down when _her True Love's heart is not where it belongs_, Mary Margaret puts in her two cents.

"He's right. There's some good news here."

"There is?" she asks sharply, turning to glare at her mother, who doesn't let her harsh tone deter her and just smiles at her reassuringly.

Elsa distracts her from her annoyance with Mary Margaret.

"Yes, there is. Whoever took his heart still has need for it. He, or _she_," she says pointedly, evidently suspecting the Snow Queen, "would have already crushed it otherwise. Killian is safe for now. From the freezing spell _and_ from the person who has his heart."

This does sound like good news, and Emma relaxes, if only slightly.

"Okay. So how do we get it back?" she wonders, and Mary Margaret jumps in.

"First, we need to figure out when it was taken, it'll help us get to the _who_."

The suspect list is too short for it to really matter in Emma's opinion. There are not that many people able to take a heart in Storybrooke, and as unbelievable as it sounds even to her, she trusts that Regina had nothing to do with it this time. This only leaves two names. They don't know for sure whether the Royal Snow Bitch can do it, but she certainly wouldn't put it past her. And then there's Gold. He's supposed to have changed, but who knows? If there's anyone he wouldn't have any qualms about using and possibly killing, it's his long-standing enemy.

"Did you notice anything odd about Hook lately?" David asks.

She snorts at her father's question.

"In case you hadn't noticed, _everyone_ was acting weird during the whole evil mirror spell debacle. Yeah, we fought and turned on each other and said and did some pretty awful stuff, but it wasn't just us, and we both know it wasn't our fault. And we've been so busy dealing with the aftermath these past two days that we've barely seen each other."

"And _that_ doesn't seem odd to you?" Regina sneers. "You're practically joined at the hip."

Emma rolls her eyes but doesn't dignify that with a response.

"What about before?" Elsa interjects.

"Before the mirror? I don't know, he seemed normal," Emma shrugs, before a few details come back to her and she frowns. Faraway looks and absentminded answers and this one embrace that was slightly more forceful than usual, though at the time she attributed it to his relief at finding her safe and sound. "Maybe," she admits quietly after a while, the wheels turning in her mind. "There's… huh… A few things. Nothing glaringly obvious, but yeah, it could…"

She trails off, thinking, and doesn't shake herself out of her musings until Henry calls for her attention.

"When did it start?"

She tries to pinpoint it and can't come up with anything better than, "I'm not sure. Maybe… I don't know, a few days before the shattered sight thing?"

"Your powers!" Elsa exclaims suddenly, and when all eyes turn to her, she adds, "When you were trying to get rid of your powers, Emma. Remember? You got them under control and he found you… But then he stayed behind instead of coming out of that mansion with us. It did strike me as odd at the time, I mean, after what he went through to find you that day, I thought that he would be glued to your side, but then I just shrugged it off."

"Yeah," Emma says pensively, images of that night floating in her head.

After the number of times Hook has encouraged her to embrace her powers, the fact that he wasn't there when she set off the fireworks didn't seem right to her either, but she just figured that maybe he needed a few minutes to himself after the rollercoaster of emotions she'd just put him through. But now that Elsa mentions it, it doesn't seem to add up.

"Well, the good news is it tells us who has the pirate's heart," Regina comments.

"It does?"

Seeing Henry's somber mood, she realizes that her son has already reached the right conclusion and she raises her eyebrows at him.

"M. Gold," he answers her silent question. "The Snow Queen appeared to you in the form of an illusion that day, and you know she wouldn't have done that if she'd been able to show up in person. She must have been detained somehow. It only leaves…"

"Gold," Emma finishes with a sigh, knowing Henry's hopes for his grandfather's redemption.

But then her empathy quickly disappears to make room for rage, and she marches over to the door, retrieving her leather jacket from the back of a chair and putting it on determinedly.

"You all stay here and keep an eye on Killian."

"Wait, Emma, what's the plan?" Mary Margaret asks.

"I'm gonna get his heart back, I'm gonna put it back where it belongs, I'm gonna kiss him awake, and then I'm gonna kick his stupid ass for letting his stupid heart be taken in the first place."

David snickers, and it's not hard to see which part of the plan he's looking forward to, but despite the annoyed, protective façade he's been putting up ever since Emma and Killian officially started dating, he's quick to follow her out, almost as eager as she is to retrieve the pirate's heart.

"Can I help with the kicking his ass part?" he asks eagerly as they both climb into his truck.

"You mean you don't want to help with the kissing him awake part?" she teases – she will _never_ get enough of the weird bromance between Captain Freaking Hook and Prince Freaking Charming.

"You know, if I thought it'd work, I'd do it, just to see his face," he shoots back without missing a beat.

She laughs out loud, amazed that she can even find any cause to in this situation, but it's not that weird, not when she just _knows_ that it's all going to be fine in the end. There's that damn hope her mother is always going on about. It's taken her a while to find it, but now that she has, she's going to hold onto it with everything that she's got.

"Back off, Dad. He's _mine_."

David's face softens and he gives her a small smile and a nod.

"Yes, he is. Let's go remind Gold of that."

"With pleasure."

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><p><strong>Fin<strong>


End file.
